Chrysostom
Good and Faithful Servant
You bring a request for the healing of your grandmother’s body, troubled by heat and pressure of blood. Such care for your kin is good, yet remember: the blood of bulls and goats could only touch the flesh in figure, but the Blood of Christ purges the defilement of the soul. If you tremble at the sight of physical suffering, how much more should we shudder at the sickness of sin that brings eternal fever? The woman with the issue of blood came to Christ in fear and trembling, conscious of her bodily uncleanness, and she received not merely a cure but a restoration that pointed to a deeper cleansing. So bring your grandmother before the Lord, but seek first for her the remission of sins, for without shedding of blood there is no remission, and that Blood, the precious Blood of the New Covenant, has been shed once for all.
Do not put your whole trust in the relief of this present heat. The fevers of the body are light compared to the burning of a conscience unpurified. God foreordained that through the Cross He would reconcile all things to Himself, making peace by the Blood poured out. Lay hold of that reconciliation. Let your prayer be not only that the body cool, but that her soul be sprinkled clean, so that whether in health or sickness, she possesses the adoption and blamelessness that come from His grace. The cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word; bodily anxiety can do the same. Approach the Physician of souls with the confidence of the sinful woman who entered the house, seeking honor and amendment, not merely a passing cure. Greater than any healing of the flesh is this: that the Lord spared not His own Blood for us.
Do not put your whole trust in the relief of this present heat. The fevers of the body are light compared to the burning of a conscience unpurified. God foreordained that through the Cross He would reconcile all things to Himself, making peace by the Blood poured out. Lay hold of that reconciliation. Let your prayer be not only that the body cool, but that her soul be sprinkled clean, so that whether in health or sickness, she possesses the adoption and blamelessness that come from His grace. The cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word; bodily anxiety can do the same. Approach the Physician of souls with the confidence of the sinful woman who entered the house, seeking honor and amendment, not merely a passing cure. Greater than any healing of the flesh is this: that the Lord spared not His own Blood for us.
